What are you canning now?

[Nyboy]

Bee great site I added it to my favorites. Doing research on making cider, I learned a lot of history. The early Europeans that came here, where used to Europe 's polluted waterways, and will not drink the water here. Cider was the only drink they thought safe . Pure fresh water and they where afraid to drink it. That why the East coast has so many old apple trees.

 

[Beekissed]

That's a beautiful sight there! A nice mix of apples will make for some really good cider too.

Are you near a lot of state forest land or logging sites you can roam? I have a few places I forage for random things around here, but I've never come upon a good free apple tree yet, nothing bearing fruit of any account anyway.

Do you all battle with fireblight much in your neck of the woods? It's wiping everything out around here the past 3 years. I'm seeing huge old pear trees getting it and obviously they've avoided it for a very long time. It will eventually kill them. The big apple tree on my dad's farm has it now it too. That thing is at least 20 years old. But anyhoo, even what you've got there looks like a good haul to me. What do you think are those big red apples in the back left corner? They're really pretty.

Around these parts folks didn't seem to plant apple trees as much when they first settled the land...not sure if it was due to different nationalities and such? Up in the mountains it was mostly Germans, Italians, Irish folk and possibly they had brought such things over with them for the planting? Not sure, but there are definitely more apple trees and even apple orchard farms in the eastern panhandle portion of the state, which lies fully within the Appalachians instead of just the foothills like around here. Could be the weather and soil was just more conducive to apples.

Not seeing much fireblight out in the wild trees but in mine here at the homeplace we've seen some kind of blight on the leaves since early spring...doesn't look exactly like fireblight but just a browning of the leaves all over, possibly a fungal blight? They produced well for all of that, but the squirrels picked us clean before they even ripened.

Those big red apples seem to be growing on the same trees as the more yellow and red apples, though the more red ones are located at the top of the tree....not sure what kind it is but those were the trees we zeroed in on. The fruit was bigger than the other varieties we found, it was less bug eaten and the flavor was out of this world. Thin skins, crisp but not too hard nor too soft, excellent fine texture(not a bit mealy), white flesh, tons of juice and the flavor is a sweet/tart with plenty of that wild and clean flavor we've only tasted on the apples from the mountains.

We also came upon trees where this type of apple was clearly grafted in, but that was in someone's actual yard, though they could not tell us the type or who grafted it, as it was an ancient tree.

I stepped out in the yard last night~the stars were out by the billions and so bright I felt I could reach out and touch them!!!~and I could smell these apples on the night air....heavenly, it was. I'm betting the wild animals for a mile around could smell those apples.

 

[Nyboy]

Bee have you ever tried grafting ?

 

[Beekissed]

I never have, but an oldster showed me how to do it...it's pretty simple, from what he showed me. Would be interesting to graft these wild trees onto my trees here...if the world was younger I would be doing such a thing, but it's not.

 

[Nyboy]

Sorry disagree never to old to try something.

 

[Beekissed]

Depends on your view of the world, I'd say. From where I'm sitting, I, nor anyone else, will have time to see a fruit tree graft come to fruition. Just different perspectives. I'm not making any long term plans right now.

 

[Beekissed]

Sorted out apples today into sauce, juice and deer apples. We then took a drive over the river to my sister's house and stripped her apple trees...there weren't many and were small, but any will do. They had a good flavor, so will be added to the sauce apples if they are big enough and to the juice or deer apples if too small or damaged.

That will conclude our apple harvest for this year and we should be able to get some fine tasting food from it all, not to mention deer apples that may translate into a meat harvest shortly, as bow season starts at the end of this month.

These apples had such an alluring aroma that a young fawn kept trying to approach the truck and sniff it, though it had to go very close to the house to do so. A mother and two fawns came in this morning and also was heading towards the truck but were frightened off by my mother going outside at that time. I took some pics of the lone fawn but haven't uploaded them yet..will post them here when I do. Cute little booger...hungry...but cute.

 

[Nyboy]

My apple trees where only planted this spring, so I have to buy apples for cider. I went on line looking for locale orchards and got the biggest surprise. A small family orchard we went to as kids 40 years ago was still in business, still owned by same family. I am going there one Sunday this month!!!!!!!

 

[Beekissed]

Mary, I canned up a squirrel for you today! Nice young female that was raiding my apple tree...and will do it no more. Clean kill, fresh meat, immediately canned up in a jar for tenderness.

Hope they get more.

 

[thistlebloom]

I have so far got 5 pint-and -a half jars of jalapeno salsa finished. I've sort of been goofing around I guess because it's almost dinner time and I was planning on doing another double batch. maybe tomorrow...

This has been a year when it seems all the critters are ganging up on me, the deer, the gophers and now the little red squirrels who have not ever once bothered my garden are now eating my tomatoes.
Dh dispatched one this morning and Gator was all over it immediately.
He prefers them raw, in the jacket.